The present invention relates to a field of the art dealing with the testing of projectile and mortar fuzes.
Large caliber projectile fuzes are presently tested by a technique known as "reverse ballastics". The problem with said technique is that it is considered to be only an approximation of the effects of an actual firing of the fuze against the target and the effects of impact on its functioning characteristics. Since, the fuze functioning information is required for all types of targets, hard and soft, it is necessary to develop a technique that gradually accelerates the target. The reason for this is to prevent the target from changing its density due to the acceleration required to bring it up to a minimum velocity. The target is accelerated by stages in an incremental manner so that the target material is not compacted. Soft and semi-hard targets are generally of more interest as they provide more stringent requirements on the fuze.
Fuze items are produced and tested in relatively large quantities. The advantage of testing in the reverse ballastics facility is that the fuze is in a fixed position and, therefore, can be instrumented simply and directly with a hard wire. With direct ballistics (firing the fuze fixed to a projectile at the target) the conventional approach would be to use RF telemetry to obtain the fuze functioning information. The conventional telemetry involves extremely high cost per shot as each fuze fired requires a new projectile. This means that utilizing RF telemetry, a new transmitting antenna would be required for every shot, and even modification of each projectile alone represents a high cost. Obviously, the conventional RF telemetry approach was considered impractical. The recognition of this fact by the inventors contributed to the conception of the present invention.